Olympic Peninsula

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Lavender, Logs and National Forests

Upon arriving on the Olympic Peninsula we spent 1 night in Sequim at a Harvest Host 
that was a beautiful lavender farm


The farm is open to the public and they encourage people to walk in the fields and take pictures.
There is a gift shop and an ice cream shop where they sell lavender flavored ice cream.

While walking through all the lavender fields you can't help but notice the thousands of bees, 
big bees, buzzing everywhere out in the fields. 


I never paid much attention to such things before but you could actually see hundreds of  bees flying back and forth to the bee hive boxes at the one end of the property.  

Of course every farm has to have chicken. right?


Really beautiful in the morning light 


We took a hike out on the Dungeness Spit which goes 5 1/2 miles out into the 
Strait of Juan De Fucco which separates the US from Canada


That's Mt Baker in the distance behind the old lighthouse and no, this photo was not altered


It was miles rocky beach, driftwood and sea gulls and while sitting on a log taking a break 
a humpback whale surfaced about 100 yards away. We spent the next 10 minutes watching him continue on his way north, surfacing, spouting water, and back under for a minute and then surfacing and spouting again and again and again. 
What a great afternoon..  


Just a short drive away is the Olympic National Park where many of the huge Douglas Fir, Sitka Spruce, Red Cedar and Western Hemlock trees stand over 150 feet tall.  
Many of these giants are over 600 years old and were standing here long before
Columbus sailed to the new world.


By counting the rings of this Douglas Fir tree which was cut down in the late 1990's, 
we can tell that it's long life began around 1349


We spent a couple of days hiking through this temperate coastal  rain forest with it's huge trees, 
Mountains, water falls and glaciers



Up on Hurricane Ridge we saw the vanishing glaciers in the distance


And back down in the town of Port Angeles there is a thriving waterfront where you can have lunch while watching the freighters, ferries and tug boats come and go.



The large ferry below sails from Port Angeles to Victoria BC carrying cars, motorhomes, tractor trailers and hundreds of people. We will be sailing on it as walk ons when we go 
to Victoria in out next blog post


Stay tuned for more adventure...

















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